A Bunnie in Time
by The Rune Reverend
Summary: Bunnie Rabbot decides to use the Time Stones to go back in time and undo the horrific accident that resulted in her robotic limbs. When she returns, she finds out the consequences of changing the past are quite severe. Now she must do everything she can to undo the damage she's caused.
1. Chapter 1

"A BUNNIE IN TIME"

**Author's Note: I made this story a while back for my good friend and fellow fanfic author Robert Brown (Listed here as Proforce, you can find him in my fav. author's list). I asked him to give me a writing challenge about anything he wanted. He told me to write a story about Bunnie going back in time, since she was notably absent from the Two part SatAM Episode "A Blast to the Past". The following is the result of his request.**

CHAPTER ONE

It had taken a little over three months for Bunnie Rabbot to work up the nerve to steal from her best friend. She didn't like the idea of taking something from Princess Sally-she was not a greedy person by nature, nor what her intended theft a matter of stealing for the sake of wanting something. This was something personal and it was something she had to do all on her own.

At sixteen, Bunnie had been living well over five years with a curse no other Mobian was forced to endure. Every time she went to bed, she lied on her back and turning over onto her side could have disastrous results if she wasn't careful. She could smash her bed to pieces and although her never complained when he had to fix something that she had accidentally broken, but she hated to see that she was being a burden to her friends. There were better things for him to do than fix her clumsy mistakes.

He was constantly doing things to her legs and arm-both robotic-and while the exact nature of the Roboticizer was still a mystery, Bunnie still got chills thinking of the spare rods and bolts that he gone into repairing her over the years. Were those going to become flesh and blood if she were ever De-Roboticized? Or were they going to stay the same? She had nightmares of x-rays of her body filled with a cloud of screws and rivets and in her darkest of nightmares she lie still, in a wheelchair, with only her left arm to do for her. When she looked down to her pelvis, she had only cold steel from her waist down. It was a crude and embarrassing way of life for her and lately she had begun to think she would not be able to be a mother and bear her own children. She would not even be able to make love to a man and at sixteen she had begun to more than wonder what she would be missing.

Be they justified or simple nerves, Bunnie was determined to do something more than simply put herself in another malfunctioning machine and cross her fingers.

But to do this, she had to steal from Sally.

She had planned and studied. Bunnie knew Sally better than anyone and that included her schedule. As it so happened, she had planned for this particular instance. A late spring storm had brought the river level to it's crest and it wasn't unheard of for a large bit of timber to break one of the bridge's support beams. It was not hard to make the beam look like it was struck by a fallen tree trunk. Sally had a stock of replacements, but it was still an all day job without her.

They would make due on their own, just for today.

She had herself buried in her blankets when Sally came knocking at her door.

Bunnie let out a raspy cough and said, "Come in" as weakly as she could.

Sally came in and saw the humidifier, the crumpled handkerchiefs, and Bunnie laying in bed with her back to the door and put two and two together. "Bunnie, are you sick?"

"Yah, Sally-girl. Musta got me one-o them spring bugs." She added a few coughs and a deep sniffle to add a little proof. She only hoped Sally would buy it and not recognize their old sick routine from when they were little girls. It never fooled Rosie, but Bunnie had never skirted work and never had a reason to deceive Sally before.

"Oh. Well, the bridge got hit by a tree truck and snapped one of the support beams. We could really use your help with it."

In one of her rare moments of anger, Bunnie felt a flush of red rise in her cheeks. Would they need her help if she wasn't a walking forklift? It was petty and cruel of her to thin so but she used it for fuel, building the fire of her determination to do the final deed.

"Aw, come on, Sally-girl. Can't it wait till tomorrow?"

Sally rubbed her chin thoughtfully. "I suppose we can to some of the preliminary work ourselves and get it ready for whenever you feel better. The water is still a bit high anyway. Sure, take some time to rest. I'll be gone all day, though. Can you watch after yourself?"

"Ah'll be fine, sugar. Jes' go an' take care-o that there bridge. Ah promise ah'll feel better in the morning'."

"Alright. Rest well, Bunnie." Sally closed the door behind her and prepared for a day of work and preparations that would have sped by much faster if Bunnie hadn't fallen ill.

In her hut, Bunnie waited.

After an hour, she knew Sally would have all of Knothole helping on the problem. By her reckoning, she had till sundown. She might not need it, but she had to have everything go off without a hitch. It had to be perfect, no piece out of place. Thinking so far ahead was normally Sally's job, but this was personal to her in a way Sally couldn't truly understand.

When she was sure the whole of the village was ten minutes walk away, she reached under her covers and produced a bundle. Tucking it under her arm, she went out through her front door and made her way to Sally's hut, just a short jog away. She shut the door behind her and secured the latch, just to be sure. Then she took five steps forward and tapped the floorboards with her foot until one of them sounded a little off.

Bunnie punched through the floor and tore the floorboards apart until she finally reached down and produced a wooden box with a lock on it. She broke the lock off easily and gasped when she looked inside, a soft, golden glow emerging from within.

With great reverence, Bunnie pulled the Time Stones out of their hidden chest.


	2. Chapter 2

**CHAPTER TWO**

Bunnie had never thought she was someone who could be shocked into stunned silence easily, but Sally had made a confession almost a half year before, when she had told Bunnie about her attempt to stop Robotnik in the past. That missions hadn't gone as expected and Bunnie had found the whole story a bit far-fetched-even for Sonic and the rest of them-but the truth had been in front of her eyes. Sally had told her of the one thing they had managed to change: Rosie.

She couldn't even begin to imagine their life without their nanny. The woman had been more their mother than their own mothers. A few of the others didn't remember their mothers, but Bunnie did. She knew motherly love and Rosie was filled to the brim with it, even if she had never had her own. Each of them was her child in some way.

Bunnie had remembered her mother and the last thing spoken between them:

"_Ah need you to be strong , Bunnie. Yer friends need you to be strong."_

"_Ah'll be strong for you, Mama."_

Rosie had not always been there according to Sally. Sally had given her a warning in the past and prevented their nanny from being robotized.

That had sent a jolt up Bunnie's spine. Already, she had begun to form ideas and plans, the how, where, and why of it. She had finally justified the act in her mind and put the nuts and bolts of it together until she stood here, now, with the answer to her problem staring her in the face.

Each of her hands held a Time Stone and she had to push down her nervousness in order to remember what Sally had told her, what had put them back to a time when they could right a terrible wrong. She closed her eyes, drew the Stones together, and began chanting.

"The Great Forest…3229...The Great Forest…3229.…The Great Forest…3229!"

Her body flooded with an electric feeling-even her robotic limbs, which she hadn't felt anything in since her temporary Derobotization the year before. She imagined this was how Sonic felt using his Power Rings, filled with energy and unable to do enough to burn it off. It rose and rose within her, until she couldn't bring herself to hold the Stones a moment longer.

"_Don't stop, girl. You can do this!"_

As suddenly as it started, it stopped. Bunnie opened her eyes and all was quiet in the world. At first she thought the Stones had taken her sight, but she blinked twice and noticed tiny pinpoints of light beaming down through the canopy of the Great Forest.

It was early morning. The sun wasn't even up. She was in the middle of the Great Forest, whereas a moment before she had been standing in Sally's hut.

"Oh mah stars!" she said breathlessly, "It worked!"

She had to look around to gain her bearings, but the Great Forest had been standing for a long time and since the Freedom Fighters had long since learned to navigate without the use of markers, she had to make her way by landmarks and simply recognizing the patterns of the trees. Bunnie knew where to go and what she was looking for. If this were the day she had imagined, then she knew the day's events in the back of her mind.

XxXxXxXxXxX

Hunched in the bushes, Bunnie sat for hours near a bubbling brook with a small rock outcropping on the side. She had taken the bundle from her house and pulled out one of Rosie's dark gray dresses and red hooded cape. It fit a little loosely, but for what she intended it would work. With the hood up, the shadow would keep her face obscured. It hadn't stopped Sonic and Sally from being revealed to their younger selves, but Bunnie's younger self was older, less likely to be fooled. She wasn't sure what would happen if she knew she was meddling with her older self, but Bunnie wasn't willing to take the chance.

It was close to noon when she finally heard giggling and running footsteps. She perched low in her spot and watched as into the clearing next to the brook came a bounding girl rabbit of no less than nine years old. With the same old ribbons tied into her ears and not a stitch of clothing, the girl bounded with an endless innocence the defied the war going on outside the forest canopy.

Bunnie looked around. Where were they? She remembered their sound exceptionally.

On time, the clanging footsteps sounded and a squadron of Swatbots carrying a portable Roboticizer. One of the old raids that Robotnik used to carry out before Sonic and the Freedom Fighters became such a menace that he kept all his forces bound to the city to protect himself. He would frequently try and rout the few Mobians who had hidden from him.

This was where and how it happened. But not this time.

She leapt up from her hiding spot, but not in time to stop the first Swatbot from warbling in it's monotonous alarm. _"You are under arrest by order of Dr. Robotnik!"_

The young Bunnie jumped up and started running away and was promptly shot in the back with the stun setting on the Swatbot's laser rifle. She had been shot with that once before and was nauseous just thinking about it. She didn't have much time.

"HII-YAH!" She launched herself out of the bushes and through the nearest bot, tearing it in half at the hip joint. Two steps later she delivered a savage roundhouse kick that took four heads off at once. The final two that were left final figured out to use their laser rifles, but Bunnie picked up the torso of a Swatbot and blocked their shots. She dodged to the side and hurled the torso at one Swatbot, knocking it down. She picked up another severed head and slung it at the final Swatbot, lodging the saucer-shaped head into the chest plate. It fell in a slow tumble off its feet. The fallen Swatbot was trying to get up. She leapt into the air and landed with her foot on the bot's head, crushing it.

Around her, the devastation was complete. No Swatbots stood standing and when she looked back, her younger self was splayed across the ground, out cold for the next few hours.

She hadn't remembered getting stunned, but the stun effect had a jarring effect on the memory. Things got fuzzy and hard to recall, but this time, when her younger self awoke, she would be home, in her bed rather than the cold embrace of the Roboticizer. She herself could barely remember the amethyst rays bearing down on her.

But those rays would never touch her now. She scooped up her younger self in her arms and took her a few hundred yards down the brook to a familiar fork she would be sure to recognize when she awoke. For a moment, Bunnie thought about trying to fake a strike to the head with a fallen branch, maybe fool herself into thinking a limb had fallen on her and simply thought best of it. She would wake and go home, not sure of what had happened, but letting it past.

Home, with all her limbs in tact, her body whole.

She returned to the site of the Swatbot carnage and dragged the remains to a nearby gully and tossed them in. In a year's time, the forest growth and falling leaves would cover them up easily. As for the portable Roboticizer, she smashed in the glass front and tossed it into the gully with the robots.

Bunnie smiled to herself. "That outta bout do it."

He took the Time Stones out of her backpack and held them in her hands, closing her eyes, chanting softly, "The Great Forest…3235...The Great Forest…3235...The Great Forest…3235." The immense power filled her every being, her thoughts stretched into white light.

When Bunnie opened her eyes again, she found herself standing in Hell.


	3. Chapter 3

**CHAPTER THREE**

There was no words to contain her horror. Mouth slack and eyes wrought in despair, Bunnie fell to her knees and cried out loud. She had come back in the middle of Robotropolis. The ground was hard and cracked, baked with grime and pollution. Above her, the sky was a dark gray, thick with the choking smoke of the city. Nearby, a brook of foul sludge, black as ink, bubbled a foul order into the air.

But when she scanned the area around her, she found no buildings. Instead, the landscape was lined with tombs.

No, not tombs, she realized. Stumps.

Tree stumps.

Crawling on her hands and knees, she crawled over to the nearest stump and put her hand on it. This had been a tree as wide around as she was tall. She rubbed her fingers over it, trying to understand what this was, what it meant, what had happened. She loved the trees. They proved for them and had sheltered her from the elements and from Robotnik for a decade or more. But now, they were gone. Tombs was more correct than stumps, because what was left of the Great Forest was now a graveyard of the once beautiful greenery that had been her home.

"Oh mah stars. What happened?"

In the far distance, like a blight on the landscape, she could see the dark stain of Robotropolis. But here, where she stood, if she had her direction right, she was very much in the heart of the Great Forest beside the very same creek.

Bunnie stood to her feet and looked down. Her two legs were still robotic, as was her arm. Tears welling in her eyes, she wondered how. What had gone wrong?

Then the full impact hit her: _Knothole! Sonic! Sally! Antoine! Tails! Rotor!_

She let out a gasp and tried to look and gain her bearings, but the trees were gone, as were the markings. Frantic, she spun around and around, trying to gain a sense of direction until she looks down and realized she can follow the brooks until they join the river, which passed through Knothole.

The one hope is all the glimmer she needs. Bunnie set out for Knothole and ran tirelessly. The fifteen mile treks to and fro Robotropolis had kept her in exceptional fitness, so the run to Knothole was next to nothing for her.

When she finally arrived, she only knew it was Knothole because of the rubble. Of the common house and the huts, only blackened rubble remained. The stumps of the support beams under the huts jutted out like tiny tombs. The bridge's supports were like jagged teeth rising from the river and the common house had crashed to the ground and burned to cinder.

A foul wind blew a horrid stench through the air. Bunnie had to force herself to not cry at the sight of Knothole so ruined. She walked through the ghostly remains, circling around and taking in each terrible sight. Rotor's workshop looked as thought an explosion had gone off inside. The area around it was ankle deep in bits of rusted and useless machinery and gadgets. Rosie's hut was half-collapsed , with the hay and mortar walls corroded and broken beyond repair.

Something scuffed Bunnie's foot and she looked down. Something half buried in the ground stuck out and she reached down to lift it up. When she did, she spun the object around and yelped in shock. She held a skull, filled with dirt, small enough to belong to only one person in Knothole.

She dropped Tails' skull on the ground and finally collapsed to her knees, face in her hands, sobs racking her body.

Her grief lasted what seemed forever, but Bunnie knew she would accomplish nothing now. She had to find out what had gone wrong. What had happened here? Were any of the Freedom Fighters still alive?

She rounded the village, making note of every burned out building, looking for anything of use. Nothing jumped out at her. Everything here had been ruined for years. When had all this happened?

At last, she came to the Power Ring Pool and looked inside. Impossibly, the water still looked crisp and clean. The magic of the Power Rings was unknown to any but Sonic's Uncle Chuck and it didn't surprise her that it had some kind of purifying effect on the water.

She got on her knees and inspected it before dipping her face down and taking a long, deep drink. Sure enough, the water was as clean as it looked and she drank her fill.

Suddenly, a golden glow reflected off her face. Bunnie jerked back as the Power Ring Pool began to glow gold and bubble. She looked aside and saw the old trunk was still jutting out over the pond. She scrambled over in just in time to catch the ring as it floated up above the water. Marveling at the ring, she couldn't believe the old machine down at the bottom of the pond was still working.

Not knowing what else to do with it, she decided to hang onto the Ring for the time being.

"Drop it right now!"

She spun around at the sound of the voice and for a moment didn't recognize the figure before her. The blue fur and quills were the first thing she noticed, but the boy she knew always stood loose and easy with a boyish charm to everything he did.

This young hedgehog before her was aged beyond his years, his stance ready, quills bristling angrily. Eyes once playful now brimmed with fury; not trace of recognition flashed in them.

"Sonic?" Bunnie gasped, resisting the urge to rush forward and hug him. His angry appearance startled her, but she could only see half of him, the other half concealed in shadow.

"Who are you?" He asked, "How do you know my name?"

"Sugar-hog, it's me. Bunnie."

"Hogspit! Bunnie Rabbot died years ago!"

Bunnie yanked the hood off her head and waited for Sonic to recognize her, but that seemed slow in coming. He looked long and hard, squinting a little, before finally letting out a long breath.

"Bunnie…where the _fuck _have you been?"

Bunnie had heard Sonic curse only once before. When he had learned the word from somewhere-no one ever found out where and Bunnie was sure Rosie had never spoken the word-he started slinging it around in front of the other boys and once in front of Sally and Bunnie. However that one time in front of Sally and Bunnie was also spoken with Rosie standing right behind him.

Rosie had never before and never since had to apply a spanking to any of them. Sonic's blistered posterior had prevented him from running for three days and afterwards, potty mouth was never an issue again.

"What do you mean?" Bunnie asked. "Sonic, what happened here?"

"What happened? Eobornik happened! The hell are you talking about? What happened to _you_? I thought you were dead."

Bunnie approached him and as she came near, the shadows peeled away from the side of his body, revealing the deep set scar tissue that covered the right side of his shoulder and face. His mouth curled down in an unnatural sneer and his right eye dull and white.

XxXxXxXxX

Bunnie had no choice but to confess what she had done. Sonic listened to her stoically as they sat in front of a fire in a small cave not far from Knothole. She knew she could tell him, as he was the only person who could relate to traveling through time. He watched her with his unnatural sneer, but his face was hard to read. His only offering was a flask of water. He accepted her story without question.

"Ah don't understand what went wrong, Sonic. All ah did was keep mahself from getting' Roboticized. How did all this happen?"

Sonic let out a deep, ragged breath and erupted into a fit of violent coughing. Bunnie moved to sit next to him and put her arm around him until he stopped. When Sonic finally raised his head, his hands before him were flecked in blood.

"Sonic?"

"It's the air." he said angrily, "Yiffin' Robotnik's pollutants. I been coughing this shit up for a year now. Getting' harder to breath…harder to run. Every time I juice, I spend thirty minutes coughin' up blood and…last night, I passed out. Don't know how long, but I almost got caught. Don't know much of anything anymore. Not since it all went to shit a few years back."

Bunnie took Sonic's hands in hers. "Tell me."

Sonic swallowed, which made his sneer turn into an almost comical face. "It all went wrong with that robot. The one Robotnik made to look like Sally?"

"Ah remember. Ah gave her what for."

"No, you didn't." Sonic and Bunnie shared a short look. "Bunnie, you didn't have those robot limbs you got now. Sure would have helped us out. When we found her out, she ran ahead. I got stuck in some mega muck. You…"

Sonic had to swallow hard again.

"You came in and launched yourself at her. Hit her square in the jaw, but you bounced right off. That's when she…when I saw you….Bunnie, it was-ah, what did Sal used to call that? Uhm, point blank? She used that finger laser and you just…"

Sonic put his head in his hands and moaned. "I can't say it. But when she shot you, she turned it on me and did _this_!" He gestured to his face and shoulder. "Hit me so hard I thought I was gonna die. I used a Power Ring to escape. I ran into Robotnik's fortress and that's when I saw Sal. I was too late to save her. Robotnik got her."

Bunnie put her head in her hands. "No. no, no, no, it's all mah fault."

"Why?"

"That's not what happened. Not the way ah remember it. I kicked the stuffin' outta that she-bot and pulled you outta the mega muck. You saved Sally, we blew up Robotnik's factory, and went home."

Sonic growled and kicked a rock into the fire. "Why didn't I get stuck with _that_ life? After I came back, I told everyone what happened. I had just gotten patched up when Robotnik attacked Knothole. The robot had given Ro-butt-nik the location and he brought everything he had against us. I did what I could, told Ant and Rotor and Tails to run, but they never had a chance. Not without me nearby. He did all that to Knothole. Everyone got Roboticized cause I couldn't save em'. My little buddy got hit by something in the head. In a day, they were all gone and I was the only left. I been hitting him here and there, but it's nothing. Without Sal's planning, I didn't know what else to do. Takes most of my time to just stay alive and I can't even do a decent job with that."

"Sonic, ah'm so sorry. Ah just wanted a normal life with a normal body. Ah never thought ah'd make so much a difference in everyone's life."

Sonic coughed twice and looked into Bunnie's eyes and she almost broke down into tears. His eyes were sadness personified and spoke in volumes of depth she could never hope to read. She did only what she knew she could and leaned over to kiss him on the cheek. "Ah'll make it right again, sugar-hog."

"How are you gonna do that?"

"Ah'll just go back and make things right. Ah'll use the…"

She froze. Sudden realization took her heart in an icy, frozen grip.

Sonic sensed this and asked, "What? What's wrong?"

"Oh mah stars, the _Time Stones! Ah left them behind when ah came back!"_


	4. Chapter 4

It had taken Sonic only a few moments to dash her over to the creek, but when they got there, things were not as they left them. She had spotted the flashed of lights and though nothing of them until they realized that the area in which Bunnie had reemerged was crawling with Swatbots, who were shining their lights around the area.

"They must have picked you up on their infa-whatever things." Sonic said as they peered out from behind a large stump. "He can do that now that there's nothing else here to pick up on their scanners. They pick us up and we'll be crawlin' with em in no time flat."

"So whadda we do?" Bunnie asked.

"Wait till they leave. They don't like to hang around one spot too long. We'd better back out in case-"

"Sonic, look!" Bunnie pointed to the Swatbot closest to the river. It had bent over and picked up the Time Stones where they lay in the mud. Bunnie scolded herself for simply dropping the stones when she'd come back.

"They got the Stones!" Sonic exclaimed.

"What're they gonna do? Take em?" Bunnie asked.

"They might be giving off the same kinda energy the Power Rings do. He can track that power, but for some reason he can't find the Power Ring Pool. So long as I grab em' right away and tuck em in my backpack, it's usually cool. But those Stones must be givin' that power off all the time."

Bunnie watched in horror for a moment and then turned to Sonic. "We gotta get them Stone back, Sonic. It's mah only chance. It's our only hope."

Sonic's sneer turned into a vile parody of a smile, with his mouth twisting into a boyish grin that hadn't been on his face since before Sally and Bunnie had died. "Then it's time to let it juice and cut it loose!"

Sonic blasted out of the hiding spot and _ran_. He sped faster than he ever had before, tearing into a full three squadron of Swatbots before they had a chance to know what hit them. Bunnie knew Sally would have chastised him for leaping into danger unexpectedly and without a plan, but this was different.

The old Sonic had been full of daring and bravado, his skills tempered by Sally's rational. This Sonic had been alone for a long time, had honed his skills to perfection in order to survive. When the old Sonic was in battle, he was laughing, smirking, taunting.

This Sonic was nothing of the sort. He attacked without mercy, fought without snide remarks, and tore through their ranks with brutal efficiency. No raspberries, nor cutting remarks, only the super speed he had been given upon birth. He was not just the hero of Mobius. In that moment, his fury unleashed, he was a god made in the image of a hedgehog.

Their shots fired, but missed, some wide, some near, but those near were but sheer luck only. After the first squad had fallen to his hand, he began to add flips and leaps to his repertoire of attacks. She thought she could hear him give a sharp "HA!" as two Swatbots accidentally shot one another.

The girn came back, as did the old bravado. And for a moment, there was a flash of the old Sonic in his eyes before the hardened warrior of speed returned and finished his task with efficiency. He spun through metal bodies, knocked them over, ran them into the ground, turned them upside down in miniature vortexes. His arsenal of attacks was vast and diverse, imaginative in their creation, but effective to the end.

The attack lasted only a minute-maybe two-but when it was done and the last bot fell, Sonic stood there over them, a figure out of history come to life, the child of an ancient deity brought to life in the wrong time. The scarred, menacing figure standing over a heap of broken bodies looked more like something from their ancient history books than the friend she had grown up with.

He picked up the Time Stones and grinned, holding them aloft towards Bunnie. His glimmering, happy eyes told Bunnie more than words could say: _"Just like old times, Bunnie."_

The shot from behind took him in the center of his back.

The unseen Swatbot had been knocked down, but not offline. It had taken advantage of Sonic's momentary stillness to take aim.

Sonic the Hedgehog went sprawling forward, the Time Stones scattering before him. Bunnie thought she screamed, or maybe Sonic screamed. Her blood rushed into her ears and everything came through a filter of rushing wind. Bunnie rushed forward as Sonic fell and with laser bolts erupting around her feet, she blasted past Sonic and didn't stop until she had planted gave a running kick to he Swatbot's head, sending it's saucer dome flying into the air. The neck erupted in a shower of sparks and collapsed in front of her.

Bunnie spun around and rushed to Sonic's side. Wincing at the gaping, blackened wound in his back, she spun him over. A mouthful of blood spilled out as he coughed, his breath coming in ragged gasps.

"Bunnie!" He gasped.

"Sonic, hold on, I'll take ya back and get some help! Sally-girl will-"

"Bunnie…just make…just make things right again." Sonic moaned through grinding teeth. He let loose a long, deep breath and it took Bunnie a moment to realize he would not take another breath inward.

Bunnie choked a sob in her throat, knowing he was lost to her. Only one thing could make this right now. The sounds of Swatbots sirens filled the air, closer than she liked. She had only a moment to correct her mistake.

She clicked the Time Stones together again.

XxXxXxXxXxX

Oak and leaves filled her nose when Bunnie breathed again; daylight and green flooded her eyes. In her life, she had never been so happy to be in the Great Forest. Her concentration returned and she put the Time Stone into her backpack knowing the difference might mean someone's life.

She had come this far and now realized that she had no idea how to fix her mistake. Her first thought was to stop herself, but a dire feeling came over her when she thought of that. Who knew what kind of trouble _that would cause, so she pushed it from her mind and took the moment walking to the original ambush spot by the creek to think of her plan._

_She went slow and the more deliberate her steps, the more horrified she was of the one answer. Reeling inside, she began to argue back and forth with her own thoughts until finally, terribly, she knew what she had to do._

_Hood over her head, Bunnie waited in the bushes once more. Distantly, the sounds of a short battle echoed through the trees, lost amidst the spring morning. It was not long before she saw herself bringing her young self to the brook, where she saw her own nine-year-old body laid beside a creek. Her hooded form took off and Bunnie emerged from her hiding spot a moment later._

_She scooped up her younger self and ran back to the original crash site. Her heart was trapped in a sinking hole, but she knew what she had to do. That other world she had created was impossibly horrible, a world with no hope and no love-not even fresh air or water._

_All because of her. In the grand scheme of things, she had not thought herself so important a player. She had thought when all was said and done that Sonic and Sally would be the ones to live on in infamy, and yet she had done something that had changed all the world she knew._

_Putting things back meant making herself strong enough to fight. It was, she knew, a small sacrifice in the scope of the world, but she held her faith that one day her time would come. But for now, for this moment of her life, she needed to be more than a simple rabbit._

_She dug the portable Roboticizer out of the sink hole and after a few frustrating minutes, managed to have it ready. However, when she flipped it on, the beam inside did not disperse over the entire length of the tube as it was meant. Without the tube to disperse the beam evenly over the whole body, it reverted to a single amethyst arc of energy firing from the top of the machine to the bottom._

_Somehow, this was exactly what she needed._

_Behind her, she heard a groaning and spun in time to see her younger self waking up groggily. She looked at Bunnie's hooded form and asked, "Who in the who-ha are you?"_

_Bunnier knelt next to her younger self and put a hand on her shoulder, "Listen…there's something' important ah gotta tell ya. Okay?"_

_Younger Bunnie nodded._

"_Good. Ah gotta do something to ya, Bunnie. It ain't right and its gonna hurt fer a long time, but believe me: its fer the best. It'll help yer friends. Ah need you to be strong, Bunnie. Yer friends need you to be strong."_

_The younger Bunnie looked up at her for a long moment and finally nodded, "Ah'll be strong fer you, mama."_

_Bunnie's voice failed her and she helped the young Bunnie to her feet and towards the vile amethyst beam, holding her own young hand in guidance._


	5. Chapter 5

Inflicting the Roboticizer on herself was the worst moment of Bunnie;s young life, but she had taken it stoically, without complaint. When the deed was done, her younger self had passed out in shock. Just as well. Bunnie laid her there in the cleaning by the creek and finally destroyed the portable Roboticizer before flinging it back into the sink hole. The implications of everything were echoing now, like silent footsteps in an empty house.

She had called her mama.

And like that, the memories long forgotten came back and Bunnie realized the truth of what had really happened to her. It sank in, but tasted no better than knowing she had inadvertently destroyed all of the Great Forest and killed herself and Sally. She had vowed to set things right, but like Sally had before, she could not resist making a change and hoped for the best. It seemed so insignificant and yet it meant everything-perhaps it would make all the difference.

She made sure that Rosie found her prone younger self before finally placing the Time Stones together for the final time: "Knothole Village….3235.…Knothole Village…3235...Knothole Village…3235" Cautiously, hopefully, Bunnie opened her eyes again as the power of the Time Stones faded.

She gasped.

She stood just outside her hut in Knothole. The sun was shining, the Forest stood tall and proud. Her right and both her feet shone their usual dull metallic color. But…

Bunnie looked down. From her navel down until her legs joined to her loins, Bunnie was flesh and blood, in place of a cold, metallic womb. She yelped aloud and tears sprang to her eyes as she reveled in the sensations of having her lower torso made of fur and flesh, but steel. She looked around, trying to find a direction to run so she could find her friend when a voice suddenly found her.

"Not so fast, little rabbit."

Bunnie looked over her shoulder at the familiar voice. She stepped into the thick of the forest and found an elderly man with a long, white beard waiting for her. He looked down his long, crooked nose at her.

"Mah stars! Lazaar?"

The ancient wizard nodded and crooked one of his ling, bony fingers. "Come with me. A talk, we shall have."

He led her to a secluded trail in the Forest and spoke as he walked.

"A mighty river, is time itself. Impossible to control, but undeniable. When through time you went, stepped out of the river, you did."

"Ah did? Is that why I always had mah arms and legs? Even when ah was dead?"

"Know not what changes you made, but protect you I did. A simple spell, years ago, when I first sensed you stepping out of time. Protected you this spell did, to ensure you would remain unchanged."

"But why? Why help me?" she asked.

"Catastrophic, time travel can be. Lucky, was your princess and little thief, they did not influence events worse than they did. My job, it is, to keep things right." Lazaar pointed to the Time Stones in her hands. "Care if you use them. Gone, my spell is, and the next change your death may be."

Bunnie looked down at her robotic limbs and sighed. "Maybe one day. But ah don't think ah want to do this again. Like you said, it's too durn dangerous. Without me, everyone woulda died years ago."

"Then best, it is, for you to keep things the same. A warning, I came only to provide." Lazaar lifted his beard out of the way of his belt and pressed a button on his belt. With a flash of light, he vanished and Bunnie was left alone in the Great Forest.

She looked at the Time Stones in her backpack and realized she would have some explaining to do, but when she told Sally the story, she would understand. A personal doubt was no friendship lost amongst the Freedom Fighters. However, Bunnie had seen the terror wrought from a wrong decision. She knew better now than to tamper with the events of Mobius as they were played out. However, the temptation should never be there.

Deliberately, she smashed the Time Stones with her feet and then hurled the pieces into the Great Forest in different directions-her robotic arm flinging them far from easy reach. In years, their magic faded, they would be nothing more than simple stones amidst the Great Forest.

Nearby, she heard Sally's laughter and Sonic raised voice. She was near the bridge, where Sally was trying to get everyone to focus on the job at hand. Sonic was goofing off while Tails and Rotor laughed at him and Antoine fussed over their lack of focus.

Smiling, Bunnie ran over to meet her friends.


End file.
